In Summer 2016 The Hidden Gardens embarked on a pilot project that brought together participants from all of our programme strands with some others who had never visited the Gardens before. They embarked on a 12 week programme of activity that centred on arts and creativity, horticulture and the environment and health and wellbeing.

Allotmenting, Ceramics, Foraging, Cooking, Walking Mindfulness and spoon carving were some of the activities tried, and Artist Ewan Sinclair worked with the group, producing a series of beautiful digital drawings which were collated into a keepsake publication for participants.

Many thanks to our wonderful volunteers who potted on numerous plants and took charge of organising a really fantastic plant and wildlife activity stall at Bungo in the Back Lanes raising over £150 for The Hidden Gardens.

I have been a volunteer at the Gardens for 5 – 6 years. My main role in that time has been helping Paula Murdoch with the Grassroots group of volunteers, who met on Wednesdays.

I am part of the group of ‘Voluntour Guides’ who give guided tours to the gardens for individuals or groups.

I joined the Board in Spring 2016, and hope that my experience as a volunteer will help the board to support the valuable work the volunteers do.

What is your role outside the Hidden Gardens?

Before I retired I was a librarian working in education (schools and colleges) and most recently in the health service. I am also interested in art, working mainly in ceramics, and have recently moved to a house with a garden so I’ve been spending a lot of time on that.

What are your special areas of interest?

Volunteering, garden management & design and art

Why do you like the Hidden Gardens?What attracted you to the Hidden Gardens?

I like the Gardens for their beauty, the history of the site shown in the design, the variety of styles & environments, I like the fact that people can engage with the Gardens on a variety of levels – a place to relax, to connect with nature, to look at plants, to learn.

The Hidden Gardens staff and volunteers had a lovely morning taking part in
the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch on Saturday 30th January 2016.

Our initial excitement at seeing a Sparrow hawk fly over the gardens was dampened when we realised that the silence meant all the wee birds had stopped singing and gone into hiding! However they did venture out again and we were very pleased with our ‘snapshot’ of the bird life in the gardens. Here’s what we saw during our hour: